It’s Time to Welcome 2018 And the Next Big Thing!

A-Commerce

What comes after e-commerce and m-commerce is A-Commerce, i.e. Augmented Commerce. Have you ever considered regarding the impact of AI and automation on your business? If not, now is the time to think about the epic efficiency gains. In addition to this, such technologies end up having a profound impact on the way customers behave, and what they expect of brands. And in 2018, nowhere is that impact more visible than in the retail industry. Moreover, if we focus on the consumer mentality, they are becoming smarter by doing several tasks. Right from embracing the outsourcing of certain retail experiences to algorithms and smart devices. This includes automation of hunting, negotiating, purchasing, delivery arrangements and more.

For example, Amazon prime! Amazon Dash buttons accustomed millions to the idea of one-touch auto-ordering. Meanwhile, you will come across millions of people who are already outsourcing financial decisions to services such as Digit. It is an auto-saving app that moves small amounts of money to a savings account whenever it sees the chance. Moreover, Alexa, show me some inspirational examples of A-Commerce. The overall implications are truly endless. All you need to take care is when consumers come to expect their online retail to be truly automated, they will bring heightened expectations of convenience with them to your physical locations. Try to make their experience as joyful as possible.

Maxing mobile AR

2017 is supposed to witness unprecedented progress in immersive content creation. Do you remember the term dimension? Yes, it’s the world’s first commercial volumetric and 3D capture studio in London that makes sure that the entire UK remains at the forefront of new mixed reality content development. In the upcoming years, it is a safe bet to say that we will come across an entire new bunch of new products and content formats emerging from this studio, with clients like Pearson and SkyVR leading the charge.

It may also interest you to know that Facebook and Apple are developing software to ‘augment’ using the existing hardware. For example, by making use of the camera on a smartphone. However, Google Tango offers an evolution in AR hardware – that may eventually pave the way for deeper adoption. In the next year, there will be some real data-driven, location-based applications of AR. What I mean is providing sports fans with real-time statistics about players as they watch a game or providing shoppers with graphical info on the provenance of the food they’re shopping for. Moreover, 2018 will also see high-profile events experimenting with VR live streaming, mirroring the success live video content has already had on social platforms.

Accelerating AI

UK government has already set out a great ambition in its support for a grand challenge in AI. At the same time, many promising early-stage companies are struggling hard to access an advanced range of computational facilities in order to train their professionals according to the new algorithms. In fact, digital is helping to remove the barriers to AI development for innovative UK start-ups through its recently launched Machine Intelligence Garage. This provides access to computational power and expertise, both of which can be prohibitively expensive for businesses starting out in this area.

Blockchain booming

According to Gartner, Blockchain is ‘descending the peak of inflated expectation’, but 2018 will be the year we see the technology moving beyond financial services and into more industrial applications inside large companies, networks of collaborators and supply chains. Furthermore, we will see effective use of for mobile AR beyond Snapchat, and better comprehend the potential of Blockchain technology.